Bite-Sized: Three's A Crowd
by that-treason
Summary: A collection of Drabbles (really short fiction, generally 100-300 words) about more complex relationships. These were mostly prompted, but sometimes just figments from nowhere. I use the prompts as writing exercises to just get thoughts out of my head, so I don't spend huge amounts of time sweating them. Each one should list a rating and characters/pairings/relationships.
1. Is this guy bothering you?

Rating: Teen  
Characters: Damon/Alaric/Katherine  
Prompt: "Is This Guy Bothering You?" for tvd_ot3 weekly drabble challenge

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It takes a lot to throw Damon off his game, but watching Ric slide an arm around Katherine and dig his face into her hair is certainly enough. He doesn't even know that he heard the words coming from Ric's mouth - he's too busy following the lines of contact between the two bodies in front of him. Bodies that should not be in contact, ever, ever, in this way.

Katherine doesn't give Ric the chance to repeat the question that started this.

"He's not bothering me - My Damon hasn't bothered me in too long really. So when I heard that the two of you have been _bothering_ each other let's say my interest was peaked. Figured it was only a matter of time till he wormed you off the vervain - so the rest was just waiting." She addresses her words to Ric, who's moved from her hair to kiss his way down to her neck, but her eyes are on Damon the whole time.

Damon knows two things in the span of a heartbeat.

One: His plan to lick his wounds in this dive with bourbon and a bartender is scotched. (An angst-filled fight with Elena, followed immediately by moralizing from Ric had driven him out of town looking for comforting distractions.)

Two: Ric has either had a complete mental breakdown or Katherine's compelled him into this... whatever this is.

Damon assumes the latter, as Ric's hands start to wander around her chest.

"I'll bite. What's the angle?"

"Does there always have to be an angle? I can't just be bored and curious?" She pouts at him, mock offense in her dark eyes and on her lips.

"There's always a _plan, _which is worse than an angle." He throws back his drink, pours another. "And one behind that and one behind that..." his voice trails off as he stares down at the glass, before he nods to himself and swallows that one down too. Tonight will be interesting, one way or another.


	2. Joy

Rating: Mature  
Characters: Bonnie/Caroline/Elena  
Prompt: "joy" for tvd_ot3 weekly drabble challenge

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Really the only surprising part is that Bonnie kisses Caroline first.

(Damon would have given them instructions to do this exact thing while he was gone, right down to the perfect camera setup, but he was too distracted by the trip to New Orleans to give even half-hearted threesome suggestions.)

She reaches out awkwardly to turn Caroline's face and pulls them together, pressing lips to lips. Caroline makes a tiny squeaky sound and her eyes go wide. Bonnie ignores this and deepens the kiss, going from chaste to passionate in seconds.

Caroline's expression softens for a moment, before she leans into the kiss and slips her tongue into Bonnie's mouth.

(Drunk Caroline has decided this is a Challenge - and Challenge Accepted she'll never do anything but her absolute best, particularly here, with Bonnie and in front of Elena. If this is happening, she's doing it right.)

Elena's in the tub, giggling to herself. She's high on blood and wine, and after all the months of ridiculous world-destroying drama, she's happy to watch her friends enjoy themselves.

(This makes perfect sense to Drunk Elena, an altogether less uptight person than Sober Elena. There's been so much tension between them all night, topped off with liberal doses of blood and expensive old alcohol and "spirit tea." They should take some joy where they find it, go back to their old selves for a little while. Sober Elena, taking a nap under Drunk Elena, knows it's too late for that.)

Drunk Elena takes another swig from the bottle she's holding and reaches her hand over the lip of the tub, down the neck of Caroline's shirt. There's another squeak from Caroline as Elena's hand contacts the skin inside her bra. Caroline breathes hard into Bonnie's mouth and sits up, banging her shoulder into the side of the tub.

Caroline breaks contact with Bonnie long enough to rattle off instructions: "_Ok, if we're doing this we're not doing it on Damon's gross floor. Bed, now._"


	3. The End of the World

Rating: PG  
Characters: Matt/Jeremy/April  
Prompt: "the end of the world" for tvd_ot3 weekly drabble challenge

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_A/N: This is absolute 100% crackfic - inspired by this comment on the AV Club review of "We'll Always Have Bourbon Street" that points out that Matt, Jeremy, and April are completely missing from the ep: "I like to think that there's a montage of Jeremy/Matt pillow fights while April stands ignored in the corner. It is a happy place." I super know it's crazy, but I also can't help myself. I hear Jeremy and Matt affecting really fake British accents, too, through this whole thing for some unknown reason. It amuses me, I'm weird._

_#####_

"Looks like the End of the World again." Matt peeks through blinds onto the lawn of the Gilbert house. He can see Klaus and Stefan and Damon and Elena and Caroline and Bonnie and Rebekah all lined up for battle. Stefan has his Tuesday Face on and Damon's rolling his eyes and Klaus won't shut up, calling everybody _love_. Elena's got her arms crossed and Caroline's got her arms crossed and Bonnie's got her arms crossed. Rebekah just checks her nails.

"Forget them," says Jeremy. "These pillows won't to fight themselves!" He throws the feather filled sack at Matt's head and jumps on the bed. Bounces, keeps bouncing, grabs another one of Elena's pillows as he falls and bounces again. Matt grins, picks it up from the floor, twirls it around in the air.

"Jeremy, you are _without a doubt_ correct. We humans have better things to do than whatever this blah blah blah is all about. Moonstones and sacrifices and cures and sire bonds and blood blood blood. Drama drama drama, whine whine whine. _They are awful_."

"Exactly so, my good friend," Jeremy replies. He falls to the bed in a sprawl, lays for a second, then sits up and pats the mattress next to himself. "I can think of _several_ better plans for our evening!

In the far corner of the room, April is mumbling into the wall. If you listen closely you can just make it out: _have you seen rebekah she promised to help me investigate the fire at my dad's place have you seen rebekah..._on and on. Her eyes are wide and empty and there's a line of drool from her mouth to her chin.

"April, dear, come join us on the bed, plenty of room for all of us. Rebekah's just outside, doing serious business with the others for yet another inexplicable reason. Come over here, _we'll_ help you investigate." Matt kisses Jeremy's neck and snuggles closer. April turns to them, wipes her chin, smiles brightly.


	4. Rain

Rating: Teen  
Characters: Damon/Elena/Stefan  
Prompt: "rain" for tvd_ot3 weekly drabble challenge

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No more than a minute passes between Elena's question and Damon dragging Stefan across the quarry by his arm.

"Hear me out. It's nothing that hasn't happened before - it's what made us what we are, point of fact. Give the girl what she wants."

"Be serious, Damon. This is nothing like what happened before, I was compelled, we were both lied to-"

"Admit it: however much you were compelled, you were still in love. We were both there and know what happened - I know it, you know it. I only brought it up to say that the precedent's been set. Look at us, fighting over Our Girlfriend all over again, even when Our Girlfriend doesn't want us to fight anymore-"

"She's not 'Our Girlfriend,' Damon, she's..."

"And, look, we can work this however you like." He starts to count on his fingers. "We can split our time with her, avoid interrupting each other. We can go on as we have been, catch as catch can. Or, we can all just pile into bed and take care of all this frankly ridiculous sexual tension all at once"

Stefan's eyes go round and he tries to respond, but his surprise means that it comes out as a squeak. Damon simply rolls his eyes and continues to steamroll right over his brother's prudish objections.

"Again, a situation not without precedent for the two of us, under slightly different circumstances and a bit more compulsion, I'll admit." Damon pauses and squints at his brother. "Fine, sweaty threesome off the table for _the moment_, but consider the rest of it. No more angsty, heart-rending, tear-jerking, middle-of-the-night conversations about gloom and doom. Just personal growth - both of us get over ourselves, get what we want, _and make the girl happy. _Remember, she asked us."

Stefan sighs and looks away, towards the floor. "How is it that our lives always come down to this?"

Damon shrugs and smirks. "Could be worse, brother ...could be raining."


	5. taking a hiatus

Rating: Mature  
Characters: Bonnie/Caroline/Elena  
Prompt: "taking a hiatus" for livejournal tvd_ot3 community's weekly drabble challenge

_A/N: This is an older tvd_ot3 prompt (from January 9th) but after some writer's block I finally got an idea in my head that I liked enough to scribble out. This is a continuation of chapter 2 ("joy") where Elena, Caroline, and Bonnie were drunk in Damon's bathroom while the boys are away in New Orleans. In that little drabble, I replaced the judgey conversation with drunken experimentation. It just sortof happened then, spur of the moment, off-top-of-my-head without a lot of planning or consideration - and this one happened much the same way. I wanted something funny and joyful after what happened last episode - drunken Caroline seemed like a good idea._

_###_

There's a note stuck to the door of the boardinghouse when they pull around in the driveway. Stefan pulls his phone out to check for missed messages; Damon speeds ahead to get a look at it. The handwriting is clearly Caroline's but it's a scrawled mess that's hard to make out in places.

#########################################

Dearest Stefan, Damon, Tyler, Matt, Jeremy, and Shane,

For the purposes of ensuring our mental/emotional/spiritual health,  
we are officially taking a break from all of you and Mystic Fallss'es'  
entire Supernatural Drama Trap of Dooooom.

Even as you read this, we are fleeing town. Maybe the county or the  
state too, we're not even sure yet. Elena keeps poking me and telling  
me not to be so specific so fine. The point is we are sooooo very out  
of here.

This is for now. We'll be back. And for serious Tyler, don't start  
making eyes at people, I'll know. Honestly, I don't know if Elena cares  
what man-slut Damon does. Honestly, she's probably cool with  
whatever. Ok, now I'm not sure, she's elbowing me a lot. I said  
'honestly' too much in this paragraph.

Anyway! Now that I'm thinking about it, it's probably wrong of me  
to tell Tyler not to make eyes at people since the three of us have  
been making hands at each other all night. Drunken-spirit-tea'd hands,  
but still.

So maybe we'll just check into a hotel and feel each other up more.  
Maybe we're starting that whole college experimentation thing early.  
Or maybe this is a vampire thing and we're just acting according  
to our nature. Doesn't explain Bonnie though. Now they're both  
hitting me, whatever.

looooooove Caroline&Elena&Bonnie

(ps. that 'love' up there is not for man-slut Damon. except for maybe  
from Elena. maybe. oww.)

#########################################

The brothers glance at each other. Damon shakes his head and Stefan sighs a little. They head inside, not even bothering to pull down the note. The door slams shut behind them.


End file.
